The Pun-ker
by Kianlon
Summary: Everyone is tired of Tai's and Davis's constant puns. They've left Yolei and Kari with no choice but to go into hiding, but this leads Tai to declare war on them. Whatever the outcome, no one is going down without a fight. Collab with Nigel the Octopus.
1. And So it Begins

**Warning: This fic contains horrible, horrible puns. Not so many in this chapter, but they're coming. You have been warned.**

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><p>Yolei wiped the sweat from her brow after finishing her latest project. "Perfecto! What do you think?"<p>

"Is this even legal?" Kari wondered as she looked it over. "Doesn't someone live here?"

"Yeah," Yolei admitted, "but it's my uncle. He's gonna be gone for two months on some business thing so I'm house-sitting!"

Kari was about to ask why one of her Jogress partner's older siblings wasn't doing it, but she didn't want to hurt her feelings by implying that she wasn't responsible. Instead she opted for, "How many uncles do you _have_, anyways?"

"Eight. This one thinks that puberty is just an alien trick so they can gradually replace everyone he knows without the change in behavior seeming too suspicious. Crazy, huh? But who cares? I get alone time for two whole months!" she gushed without so much as a pause for breath. "But enough about that, do you like it?"

"Well... Tai sure won't find us here..."

"I know, right? We're finally safe! Not even his lackey can get in here."

In the past few weeks since MaloMyotismon had been defeated, Tai's puns had been getting more and more awful. Not even Kari could stand to listen to him anymore. To make matters worse, Davis had invaded her apartment and showed no signs of ever leaving for more than meals and soccer practice. He was being "taught in the ways of the 'Wizard of Wordplay'" as Tai said every time he was called to explain why Davis was still with him. Worst of all, Davis had kicked Kari out of her own (shared) room!

All of the other DigiDestined agreed that Tai had gone too far, but no one knew what to do about it. Izzy had flat-out refused to even try to solve the problem, not wanting to be strangled by Tai again. Not even Gatomon would help, although Kari was pretty sure Tai was bribing her with salmon. Her excuse was that she needed to eliminate Miko before it killed them all in their sleep, but that was hopefully just a front.

Since Yolei's apartment was too full already and Sora was always busy, Kari had been staying with TK for the past week and a half. It had taken Tai four days to notice that she'd even left. Unfortunately, this decision had the side effect of everyone thinking that they were doing... things. All right, maybe it had been a mistake on Kari's part to admit that they'd shared the bed since her stuff took up the rest of the floor space, but Yolei would've found out anyways. Plus, his room was really cold.

After the first few days of this people had started bugging her about it, more specifically Matt and Gatomon. Gatomon didn't like that Kari was spending most of her time with the "blonde floozy" instead of "getting rid of that interloper Miko". Matt... well, he was constantly making TK do "brother stuff" and lecturing them both on living chaste and decent lives, especially after Davis had given TK condoms as a joke (the smallest size he could find) and Matt had found the full box in the trash. Heck, Matt was more protective of their "virtue" than their own mothers, who had accepted this as the next logical step.

Aside from all that, it hadn't been a bad experience. Kari would never admit it to anyone, but sharing a room with TK was a million times better than sharing a room with her brother. _TK _didn't steal her stuff, wake her up in the middle of the night just to say "hi", make awkward puns about everything, or spend hours in the bathroom combing his hair every single morning. Sure, there were downsides: the nightmares, for one thing. He had them more often than she did, but either way they both woke up and just talked about them. Normally, that would help, but they wasted so much time reminiscing that they barely got any sleep. Having two people's worth of stuff in one already untidy room was no picnic either. And then there were the posters... Matt had plastered the walls of his brother's room with them and TK was too lazy to take them down, even though neither one of them wanted to sleep with hundreds of Matts staring at them.

Since Matt was trying his best to take up all of his brother's time, Kari found herself spending more and more time with Yolei. At first it was mostly for them to vent about their sibling issues, but one fateful day they'd come up with an idea to find a place to live away from Tai. Both girls had consumed liberal amounts of caffeine and sugar. While Kari had forgotten about the plan, Yolei had spent hours perfecting it. At first Kari had thought that it was a joke, but now she was standing in a spotless four-room apartment with no windows.

Which was now a bunker. Whether that was just how Yolei's crazy uncle had made it or if Yolei had turned it into one was up for debate. The furnishing ranged from strange to bizzarre: in the living room there were two couches, a doll collection, and a hideous armchair; in the black-painted kitchen, there was a counter, fridge, freezer, _gun cabinet, _oven, and fully stocked pantry; the bedroom was quickly bolted shut by Yolei after both girls had glanced inside. It would remain blocked. Only the bathroom was semi-normal, and it had all sorts of computer equipment inside. Yolei moved two cots into the living room since the bedroom was obviously not usable and the front door was secured by four deadbolts. No one was getting in.

"It'll get Matt off my case," Kari said. "That's for sure. Are we moving our stuff in tomorrow?"

"Nah, let's do it now! I'm sure your boyfriend will help... unless he doesn't want you to leave..." Yolei teased. Kari just sighed in response. "You're no fun. We can make Cody and Ken help, too. It's so convenient that you're in my building now. All we have to do is carry our stuff down a few floors."

Kari excused herself to go tell TK about the plan. She walked in on him telling Matt and Sora off. "Um, hey, guys," she greeted timidly.

None of the three noticed her. "...and if you're gonna lecture _us _about doing stuff like I caught you guys doing - which we're not - don't do that stuff yourself!"

"It was just kissing," Sora pointed out. "Aren't you overreacting just a little?"

"My brother has been trying to keep me and Kari separated for a week and a half, given us hours' worth of speeches about morals, and yesterday he made me go clothes shopping with him. What do you think?"

She gave Matt a sidelong glance. "We'll talk about this later, _Yamato_." He blanched and glared at his younger brother.

Finally, TK noticed Kari awkwardly standing there. "How long have you been here?"

"Long enough. I'm moving out today. Wanna help?"

Matt's face transformed into the face of a child who had just received every single item on his Christmas wish list. "We'll all help! Right, Sora?"

"After everything you've done, you should carry it all by yourself," his girfriend muttered. "You don't even live with him..."

The grin faded. "Hey, if Tai's not gonna step up and help me protect our siblings' virtue, someone has to."

"_That's_ what all this was about?" Sora almost shrieked. Matt had gone too far. "They're not gonna turn into porn stars from sharing a room for a few days! Do you know how many thousands of times they've slept next to each other before? Now, they weren't dating then-"

"We're not dating!" TK and Kari protested, turning beet red.

"-but they respect each other and fear the consequences enough not to act on their barely-existant hormones. Unlike _someone _I could mention."

Now Matt was blushing as well. "Well... uh... this's been fun and all, but... gotta jet!" He ran from the apartment before Sora told them anything she'd regret. His girlfriend followed, shaking her head.

Once they were gone, it was awkward for a few moments... but then Kari started laughing. TK waited until she was finished (several minutes), then made a suggestion. "So... you pack, I'll carry?"

"I'm sorry it's such short notice-"

"It's fine. Maybe those dumb rumors will stop now... and I get my room back!" He cleared his throat. "But, uh, for what it's worth, I'll miss our talks. Patamon probably won't, though. He likes sleeping through the night."

"Me too," she giggled, picturing Patamon's face the last time she'd woken him up with a random story. "At least I'll have Yolei to talk to."

TK raised an eyebrow. "Yolei?"

"She found a safer place, close to the ground floor."

"That's a relief. It's not too far away, then."

"No," Kari agreed, "it's not."

They were able to meet the others within the hour, since it only took a half hour to get Kari's things packed. "Making out shouldn't take _that _long," Yolei teased. TK and Kari blushed while Ken and Cody exchanged horrified looks.

"We saw Matt and Sora," Kari managed to reply after an awkward pause. Yolei gave them a knowing look.

"Whatever you say... so, what do you all think of our new place?"

Ken gave the room a once-over. "It's a little weird, but okay... I could just talk to Davis about giving Kari her bed back, you know," he offered.

"No! Tai deserves to be happy, too," Kari protested. Davis was one of the few people who could stand to be in his presence.

Ken resolved to talk to Davis the next day no matter what Kari's opinion about it was.

"It isn't too bad," TK commented, trying to change the subject. "The leg lamp's a little creepy, though."

"Maybe you could move your stuff down here too!" Yolei suggested, smirking. "After all, I hate to separate you two..."

"WE'RE NOT DATING!" came the chorus.

"Let's get started," Cody ordered. "We're wasting time."

They began unpacking.

* * *

><p>"Punday is coming... mark my well-manipulated words... she can't avoid me for much longer..."<p>

"Dude, Tai, what's up on Monday?"

Tai grinned evilly. "You'll see, my protegé... you'll see."

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><p><strong>Author's Note: Hey guys, I bet you thought I was updating something. Well I'm not... yet. Chapter 8 is gonna be over 10,000 words by the time I'm done. Anyways, enough about that. This is a collab between me and Nigel the Octopus. We're alternating chapters; chapter 2 was written by her. Coming up with bad jokes and puns is really, really hard. Glad I don't have to do it yet. If you have a terrible pun, leave it in a PM to either of us or a review. Thanks for reading!<strong>


	2. You Will Be Assimilated

Ken was welcomed into the Yagami residence by Tai's mom, who escorted him to Tai's room and promised to bring snacks.

"Hey Ken, what's up?" Davis was sitting on what used to be Kari's bed playing with a soccer ball while Tai wrote something at the desk. The room didn't look like it was being shared by two different people anymore. There was only one gigantic pile of dirty clothes and all evidence of Kari ever having lived there had vanished when Davis moved in.

"Davis, this has to stop."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Ken realized this might be harder than he thought. "You kicked Kari out of her own house."

"Is she still living with her boyfriend? 'Cause I don't approve of them," Tai was suddenly standing way too close to Ken for comfort. "I need to have a talk with that boy..."

"Um, they're thirteen. Did you even explain-"

"I'm preserving her innocence as long as possible!"

Ken decided not to comment on the fact that no Digidestined was innocent. "I don't know if TK's in the bunker, but she's staying with Yolei now."

"Oh, that's better. Wait, did you say 'bunker'?"

"Yeah, Yolei made a bunker in her uncle's apartment to keep the puns away-" Now Davis _and _Tai were both up in his face.

"She made a punker," they said in unison. They were starting to freak him out.

Ken started backing away slowly from his crazy friends. They cornered him. "I just finished helping her move in..." he awkwardly trailed off.

Tai and Davis ran over to a corner and huddled up. The only thing Ken could make out was 'mewling quim', whatever that meant. He wasn't so sure he wanted to find out. But after four minutes of paralyzed indecision, they ran back towards him. Tai was making the weirdest face he had ever seen and sniggering.

"We've decided to recruit you!" Davis said as if it was an honor.

Ken was taken aback. "Recruit me? For what?"

"We gotta fight 'The Man' for our right to make puns!" Tai exclaimed.

Ken still looked skeptical. "Yolei and Kari are girls..."

"It's a _metaphor_," Tai countered.

"Let me think about this for a second... no," Ken said, moving towards the door.

Davis clasped both of Ken's hands in his. "After all we've been through together, too... but if you don't wanna... and you're my bestest fwend!" Oh no. It was The Face. And now the gogglehead was starting to cry. "I... I understwand... you don' wuv me anymowe!"

Ken sighed. Arguing would get him nowhere. Once again, he'd gotten himself involved in one of Davis's stupid plans because of The Face.

"Fine, I'll join," he conceded, "if you let go of me!"

Davis complied, and his face instantly went from tear-streaked to smiling. "Okay!"

Tai typed out an e-mail and sent it to Yolei. "The challenge has been sent! Now we just need to train you."

"In what?"

"Pun-fu!"

"You've got to be kidding me."

* * *

><p>"Avengers assemble!" Yolei shouted.<p>

Kari winced. "It's only us, and we're already assembled."

Yolei didn't seem to notice and pulled Kari close to her. She pointed Kari's face at the screen of her D terminal. "Look at this! LOOK AT IT!"

Since resistance was futile, Kari read the challenge Tai had sent.

_Dear traitors to the cause,_

_I was just going to let you live a sad, punless life, but now you've done the punforgivable. Ken informed us that you built a punker. Punacceptable! Thankfully, he didn't defect. But you! You've cut yourselves off from the pundeniable power of puns! You'd better watch your backs, 'cause this means war!_

_~Tai, Supreme Pungeoneer of the Coalition_

Kari only had one thing to say after that, "What's a 'Pungeoneer'?"

"Don't you know what this means?" Yolei was shaking her head now.

"Tai's finally gone off the deep end?"

"No! Ken's gone over to the dark side! Again! I need to recruit more people. You stay here and hold the fort!" Yolei ran off without answering Kari's question.

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><p>"We need more punple," Davis remarked.<p>

"Purple?" Ken was still new at this.

"No, people! You're terrible at pun-fu. I'll go kidnap Izzy." And with that, Tai was off.

Ken and Davis just looked at each other, thoroughly confused. Until Davis noticed that Ken wasn't training.

"Get down and make all the egg puns you can think of!"

Ken started doing push-ups or, as Davis said, 'punsh-ups'. "Um, um, eggcellent! Eggciting! Eggsperience! Uneggceptable!..." the list went on and on. Davis nodded to himself. His punpil was learning fast.

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><p>"...so, what do you say, will you join the resistance?" Yolei had just finished explaining the situation to Izzy.<p>

"That sounds like a noble-" he was cut off by Tai bursting into his room.

"You're coming with me!" the pun-crazed maniac growled. He grabbed Izzy by the wrist and dragged him away. Yolei tried to stop him, but was knocked to the ground.

"Here we go again," Izzy said with a sigh.

Tai duct taped his wrists together. "Come on, let's go recruit Matt! I don't need to kidnap _him_."

"How exactly are you going to convince him?"

He just smirked. "Let's just say I can make aaall his problems disappear."

He dragged Izzy down the street and got on a bus. For some reason they weren't getting many weird looks. Then again, kidnappings didn't look as weird as all the giant monster attacks.

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><p>Cody looked around for anything else he could use to barricade the door to his apartment. The pounding kept getting louder and he was terrified that the thing would get him.<p>

"Come on, I _know _you're in there! Open up!"

Kari had warned him this might happen. From what he knew, Yolei had gone crazy. Well, crazier. She wouldn't leave him alone and was trying to break down the door with her bare hands.

"Open this door or I'll break it down!"

He said nothing as the pounding got even harder. He could only hope she'd give up and go away.

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><p>Tai knocked on the door to Matt's room. He had picked the lock on the apartment door with some of the bobby pins he used to hold his physics-defying hair in place. Matt actually opened it fairly quickly. He had probably been trying to gel up his hair since half of it was laying flat. It looked even more ridiculous than usual.<p>

"Hey man, what's up?" Apparently Matt didn't think that it was strange for Tai to break into his apartment. Or drag Izzy with him.

"Nothing much, just declared war on Yolei's punker," he replied nonchalantly, "Wanna help?"

"No."

"I didn't want to help either..." Izzy muttered. Tai ignored him.

"Why not? She's trying to stop the pun!"

Matt had gone back to gelling his hair at this point. "And that affects me... how?"

He had a good point. Tai and Davis were the only ones who made enough puns to be more than mildly inconvenienced by this.

"She turned Kari against me!"

"That sucks, but it has nothing to do with me."

Tai started pacing, still dragging Izzy. "Don't you see? After Kari, she'll infect TK. And then they'll be punited against me! But that won't be enough for their punless-lust."

"Was that supposed to be a pun? It was worse than usual," Izzy spoke up.

"WHO SAID YOU COULD TALK? Where was I? Oh yeah, they'll have so much pent-up hate that they'll turn on you next."

"Me? What did I do?" Now his hair was perfect and he could focus on the conversation.

"You _did _annoy them for a week and a half. They might hold a grudge."

"Nah, TK loves our 'brother stuff'."

Tai hated talking about his sister as if she was anything less than the embodiment of perfection. But if it would help the cause... he grit his teeth and asked, "What about Kari?"

Matt spent a few minutes thinking over his answer. Then he exploded. "That little..." he censored himself because Tai was right there, "...angel? She'll corrupt my precious baby brother! If we win the pun war, TK won't turn against me..." he glanced at Tai and imagined the benefits of winning. TK and Kari would be separated! Or at least they'd break up.

"Where do I sign up?"

Tai handed him a taco that he had been keeping in his pocket as they started to leave, "Let's taco 'bout this over at my place..."

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><p>It was quiet, too quiet. Yolei hadn't tried to break down the door in twenty minutes. Cody didn't believe she was really gone, she was just biding her time and waiting for him to let his guard down. He grabbed a shinnai and started pacing. There was no way she could sneak up on him...<p>

"Hiya, Cody!" a voice called behind him.

"Aaah!" he swung the shinnai as hard as he could and hit Yolei in the stomach.

"Ow! What was that for?"

Cody didn't lower his weapon. "How did you get in here?"

She sat down and clutched her stomach. "You left your window unlocked. That really hurt," she groaned.

"I live on the seventh floor!"

"I climbed the fire escape and crossed over a few balconies. Do you want to join-"

"No. Get out before I call the police," he threatened.

Yolei wouldn't have left if she didn't already know that Cody's never lying thing also extended to never bluffing. She climbed back out the window and set off for Sora's. Maybe she'd listen.

* * *

><p>Tai made his way over to Sora's, still dragging Izzy.<p>

"Let me go!"

"No," he said as he knocked on the door, "I'll never let you go! I need all the cannon fodder I can get!"

Unfortunately for him, this was when Sora opened the door. She gestured for them to come in. Right after she closed the door, someone else knocked on it. It was Yolei.

"Don't open it!" Tai frantically yelled, flailing his arms around. Sora ignored him and let her in.

"You each have one minute to explain what's going on. Tai first." Kari had also warned Sora, but she wanted to hear both sides of the story for herself.

"Yolei built a punker and Kari turned against me and I need your help to preserve the art of the pun!" he said in one breath.

Izzy started laughing. Tai punched hm. "Don't disrespect the cause!"

His time ran out, and Yolei started talking.

"Tai is really, really, _really _annoying, so I made a bunker and invited Kari in. He sent us a threatening e-mail so now it's war. Help stop the puns from crushing us?"

"I've decided to join..." Sora paused for dramatic effect, "Team Sora. For everyone who doesn't care about your stupid war."

Izzy immediately defected. "I'm joining Team Sora."

"You can't do that! You're on Team Tai and we have a no return policy!" Tai pleaded. He tightened his grip on Izzy's wrist. Izzy managed to shake him off and ran over to Sora. She removed the duct tape from his arms and glared at Tai.

"_This_ is why I didn't join your team," she looked over at Yolei, who was nursing her bruised stomach. "What happened to you?"

"Cody attacked me..."

"Why'd he do that?"

"I sorta climbed through his window..."

"You broke into his apartment?"

"No," Yolei replied, "I entered his apartment. There was no breaking involved."

Now Sora was glaring at her. "And _that's _why I didn't join _your _team."

Tai and Yolei glanced at each other and decided that the time had come to leave. "Two days, soccer field, noon. Be there or be square," Tai ordered, storming off in the opposite direction of where Yolei was headed. Sora nodded, then turned to Izzy.

"C'mon, let's go save Joe." She was one of three people who actually remembered where his apartment was.

They set off, Izzy muttering "Soccer fields aren't square..." under his breath.

After about half an hour they finally got there. Sora breathed a sigh of relief; they weren't too late. "All right, knock," she said, hoping that Joe's dad wouldn't answer. He scared her.

Apparently, he scared Izzy, too. "No way!"

"I'm team leader..."

"Please tell me you're not turning into _Tai..."_

_"You didn't just go there..." _she warned.

Okay, he realized that that had been a low blow. "Still not doing it."

"Please?"

"No!"

"_Please?"_

"No!"

Joe opened the door, his expression neutral. "Keep it up, some of the neighbors might not've heard you."

"We're here to rescue you and _this _is the thanks you give us?" Izzy blurted.

"Kari warned me this might happen... let's hear _your _pitch," the older boy deadpanned, "I just got off the phone with Tai."

Sora saw her opportunity. "We don't care about the war, but since we're getting sucked in anyways, you can help us out."

"Not like I have anything better to do..."

"Then we can go," Izzy said firmly. "See you in two days."

* * *

><p>Tai and Yolei both realized that there was now only one person left to recruit. They glared at each other as they waited outside the door to TK's apartment. His mom opened the door and they instantly sprang to attention.<p>

"Can I help you?"

"Is TK there?" they asked in unison, glaring at each other again.

"I sent him to run some errands. He'll be back in two hours."

Tai elected to wait in the hallway for two hours like a creeper, while Yolei walked back to the bunker. When she got there she couldn't decide if she should be laughing or screaming.

TK and Kari were sitting on the couch talking to each other. Kari noticed that she had returned, waved, and went back to her conversation with TK.

"How long have you been here?" Yolei asked in a sickeningly sweet voice.

TK barely looked up. "Oh, I came over a few minutes after you left."

Yolei was frustrated that he'd been in the bunker the whole time. She was also confused.

"Your mom said you were running errands for her."

"That's just a cover story for if Tai shows up. Did he show up?"

"Yes. He's probably still waiting in the hall like a stalker. Now you're on Team Yolei."

Hawkmon spoke up. "I think it should be called Team Kari because she's the one who recruited TK, the only new member."

Before Yolei could reply, TK seconded her partner's opinion. The only reason the new name didn't stick was Kari refusing to have the team named after her.

"Can we Digimon choose teams?" Hawkmon asked.

Yolei considered this. "As long as the teams are even, fine."

"Awesome! As soon as it's safe, I'll go get Patamon!" TK announced as Yolei sent out an official notice.

* * *

><p>Tai was still waiting. It had been way longer than two hours, but he wouldn't give up. Not ever. After the fifth hour, a policeman walked up to him. "I've gotten numerous complaints about your loitering in this hallway. Clear out, son."<p>

"But-"

"You're scaring everyone, now go!"

Grumbling under his breath, Tai left the apartment complex, escorted by the police officer.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note: And that's all we already had written. Spell check on this site is really, really annoying. Especially when it tries to change pretty much every name in the story. Oh well, Open Office corrects all my stuff to Digimon-related terms for no reason, so...<strong>


	3. Now with 50 Pun-cent more Words

"Gatomon, please?"

"No!"

"Please? I'll buy you some tuna! And a new bed!"

Gatomon glared at her partner through the mail slot. "I'm not being on the same team as that blond floozy, and that's final."

"What'd Matt ever do to you?" Kari asked, puzzled. Behind that mail slot, she was sure Gatomon was facepalming.

"Not him, the short one!"

"Yeah, Matt. Did he annoy you too?"

Gatomon was silent for a few moments and Kari thought she heard banging. "No, no, no! I meant TK."

"How is he a floozy?"

"Never mind that now. I don't care about this stuff: I'll just join Sora's team since I can't stand Tai and Davis."

"But don't you wanna be with me?"

Gatomon considered. "Hm... not until this is over and you get your bed back. I'm _not_ apartment-hopping with you. But if we're on separate teams then either one of us can take Tai down! We can _both_ destroy his team."

"All right," Kari sighed, "Join Team Sora."

"Y'know, for being the one that makes everyone want to protect her just by existing, you're a pretty terrible recruiter."

"Thanks." They both smiled. As Kari turned to leave, she bumped into a poorly disguised Agumon. "Oh, sorry!

Agumon pushed back the hood of his too-small hoodie. "Kari, can I ask you something?"

"Sure!" She had been going to go talk to Cody, but it could wait.

"C-can I join your team? I just want the puns to stop... I mean, if _I'm_ getting annoyed, and I'm his partner and everything, I can't imagine how terrible it is for everyone else," he squeaked.

"Of course you can!" Kari exclaimed, "C'mon, I'll take you back to the bunker."

* * *

><p>"All right, troops, state your name and reason for joining," Tai barked in his best drill sergeant voice. "I am your pun-resident. Your pun-manding officer. The Grand Pungeoneer. Obey my orders without question and we'll go far together. Disobey... and no food. Who's first?"<p>

Gomamon pushed himself forward. "I'm here because this seemed like it'd annoy Joe the most."

Davis nodded. "Pun-derstandable. Next!"

"We're here 'cause you'n' Ken're here!" Veemon said, gesturing to himself and Wormmon.

"Good. Now, all of you, egg drop and give me twenty!" Tai ordered.

* * *

><p>Sora looked through her open apartment door. "Can I help you?"<p>

"We're here to join up." Four Digimon were standing outside, Biyomon looking rather pleased with herself. She had gathered Tentomon, Gabumon, Gatomon, and herself.

"Okay, cool. But it's a little early... wait, Gatomon? I thought you were with Kari!" Sora exclaimed. The feline shrugged.

"Nah, she's spending too much time with the blond floozy and his brother's really getting on me nerves. And no way was I gonna join up with _Tai..._ so here I am."

Gabumon glanced at Sora as he reprimanded Gatomon, "I know Matt's been... not himself, lately, but he would _never_ be that promiscuous, especially around Kari. He already has a mate."

"Wait, what?" Gatomon listened as Gabumon explained the meaning of the word floozy. Her eyes widened. No wonder Kari had thought that she'd meant Matt... she decided not to tell anyone here otherwise. Sora was blushing enough already. Although even Sora would admit that with some of the things Matt did on stage "floozy" wasn't stretching it too much.

Biyomon and Tentomon had no idea what they were talking about. "Say, is Izzy still here?" the beetle-like Digimon asked. "He never came home last night!"

"He'd better not be," Sora muttered, the blush fading. But sure enough, Izzy was still sitting in her dad's home office (not that he was ever there to use it anyways...) tinkering with the computer. Of course.

Tentomon knew there was only one way to get his attention, so he zapped his partner with a very low power Super Shocker. "What was that for?" Izzy demanded angrily.

"It's been fifteen hours..." Sora pointed out. Izzy looked at his watch.

"So it has." He made no move to get up.

"Oh no, you are _not _staying here another night! Do you _want_ my mom to flip out? Do you _want _to become the next TK and Kari?" she asked rhetorically, preparing to pull his chair out from under him.

"Five more min- hey! Tentomon, help me out here!" he grabbed the desk and hung on for dear life.

Tentomon responded by turning his back on his partner. No way was he getting involved in _that_.

While Sora and Izzy continued their "battle" Gatomon attempted to make conversation. "I thought you'd be with Matt, Gabumon."

"So did I, but he's been acting very strangely, muttering about revenge and making TK love him again. Then he went and joined Tai, so I figured if this team wins everything will go back to normal," he explained.

"It will," Biyomon assured him, ignoring the slap fight going on in the background. "If anyone can knock some sense into them, it's Sora."

The fight suddenly ended when Sora realized that Izzy was sitting in a swivel chair. "I-concede... just-stop-spinning-me!"

Sora relented. "Go home. We've got a meeting tomorrow."

"Fine. C'mon, Tentomon." The two left, Biyomon slamming the door behind them.

"What about us?" Gatomon asked, "Tai's making Matt live with him and no _way _am I going back there when there's _four_ guys. Human males are disgusting!"

"I have to agree with you there... how did you stand Tai and Davis for that long?" Biyomon wondered.

She received a smirk in response. "Ear plugs and bribery. But with them 'training' Ken and Matt, those won't be enough."

"She's right," Gabumon agreed. "I would just stay with Matt's dad, but he'd forget to buy food again." Both of them gave Sora their best puppy-dog (or kitty-cat) faces.

She gave in. "All right, you can stay here, but I'm not gonna be the one to tell Mom that we're feeding _three_ Digimon now."

* * *

><p>"Is this really such a good idea, Yolei?" Hawkmon asked. "You could get arrested for this!"<p>

"Bah, it won't be that bad! All I have to do is get up there!" She and Hawkmon were standing on the fire escape three stories down from Cody's apartment. Sure, she'd sent Kari to talk, but that was just a diversion. Her real plan was to sneak in while they were busy. "Do your thing!"

Hawkmon sighed. It would be pointless to argue. He Digivolved into Aquilamon and Yolei hopped onto his back. They flew up to Cody's window only to discover that it was locked. "Darn! Time for Plan B. Use your attack!"

"Um, let's wait and see if Kari can persuade him, "Aquilamon suggested.

"Ugh, fine, we'll give her five minutes. But if she doesn't convince him fast enough, it'll be time for Operation: Blast Laser..."

* * *

><p>After letting Agumon into the bunker, TK explained the basics to him then called his mom from his Ladybug*.<p>

"Hey, Mom. Yeah, I- how'd you know? Kari told you? Okay, next question: is Tai still out there? ... a police officer escorted him out last night and he _came back?_ Wow... yeah, I need to get Patamon, but if Tai... wait, he has _what?_ Why does everyone keep trying to kidnap me?... All right, I'll wait... say, while we're talking, can I get a real cell-" he closed the "phone". "She hung up on me!"

"Why is Tai stalking you?" Agumon asked. "Usually he only does that kind of stuff to Izzy."

"I don't know! Maybe Matt put him up to it or something."

Agumon considered this. "Maybe. Or he's mad at you for the whole Kari thing and wants to make sure no one interferes with his revenge."

"No one _else_ ever has to deal with homicidal older brothers... I'm gonna regret asking this, but what has Tai told you about his plans?"

Agumon told him what he knew. "... and then when he steals his mom's estrogen medicine stuff-"

"Okay, that's enough," TK interrupted. He'd taken enough biology to know where this was headed. Now there was no _way _he was going over there alone. He thought about e-mailing Matt, but he didn't want a fight to break out.

On second thought, it would be a good idea to let Matt know about Tai's plans, just in case. So he tapped out a quick e-mail on his D-Terminal. "There. That should take care of things."

* * *

><p>Kari and Cody had finally reached an agreement: Cody wouldn't have to join any of the teams. He'd be the judge if they needed one. Armadillomon wanted to join Team Yolei, so he would be allowed to; they needed him for even teams anyway. Plus, he had a deep hatred of puns. Kari was just about to leave when she noticed something circling outside Cody's window. "Can I open this?" she asked, recognizing it. Only Yolei...<p>

"Go ahead. She can give you a ride back," Cody said as Kari opened the window. "Faster than going down all these stairs."

"I don't like stairs," Armadillomon commented.

"You knew we were out here the whole time? Co-dy!" Yolei pouted. "How far can you jump, Kari?"

She gauged the distance. "Far enough. You ready, Armadillomon?"

"As I'll ever be," he gulped.

They jumped, barely making it. "Sorry, that was as close as I could get," Aquilamon apologized.

"It's okay... hm, has anyone had lunch today?" Kari asked.

They shook their heads. "Let's go to that new revolving sushi place." Yolei suggested.

"Maybe we should pick up something for the others," Kari offered.

The girls looked at each other and burst out laughing.

* * *

><p>"Hey, man, can I talk to you about something?" Matt said to Tai. The self-proclaimed "pun-resident" blinked.<p>

"Sure ya can," he replied. They stepped into Tai's bathroom and closed the door. "I've been waiting for this day to come!"

"What, no puns?" Matt joked, silently cursing his own stupidity.

Tai shook his head. "A friend's love life is a serious matter," As Matt gaped at him, he continued, "So, she crushing on someone else? Reject your gifts? Say she's busy when she's just messing with some stupid flowers? Spill, man!"

Those were all reasons why Tai and Sora's relationship had collapsed before high school even began... or they'd turned thirteen. All the more reason for Matt's firm belief that twelve-year-olds shouldn't date.

"I don't want a sister, Tai," Matt warned, causing the other boy's face to turn a variety of colors before going back to normal.

"Agumon told him about the scrapped plan? Ah well, now I don't have to hurry back there. My real plan is working!"

"I'm almost scared to ask," Matt sighed.

"Yeah, I kinda realized that turning TK into a girl would make Kari hate my guts... it'd prob-balls-ly just make their relationship stron-girl, with my luck. So my new plan is to make sure he can't go collect Patamon so Yolei's team has to start down a member. Pretty good, huh, Matt?"

Matt was stunned. "That's actually a... a decent strategy!"

"Exactly! Now, back to training! I have to go creep on your brother."

Tai found himself on the receiving end of a noogie. "At least find a better way to say it!"

"I have to go, um, pun-posely keep him away from Patamon?"

Once Matt stopped the noogie, Tai grabbed some bread, a roll of duct tape, and a giant pair of scissors. Shoving it all in his pants, he ran for the door. "Time for an elevator stalk-out!"

* * *

><p>"What's taking them so long? I'm hungry!" Agumon complained.<p>

TK didn't even bother to point out that they'd already had lunch. Less than a half hour ago. "Yolei's probably doing something illegal again..."

"We're back!" Yolei announced, having unlocked the door without them noticing.

"Did you bring any food with you? I'm starving!" Agumon whined.

Kari shook her head. "We would've brought you guys something, but _someone _ate so much sushi we ran out of money."

Armadillomon looked very pleased with himself. "They shouldn'ta kicked us out, though, y'know?"

"Didn't Cody ever tell you to show some restraint?" Hawkmon asked.

"Usually he does, but he said this time it wasn't as important," the gluttonous Digimon answered.

"Tai told me the same thing before I left!" Agumon exclaimed.

Yolei glared at the wall. "I know what they're trying to pull, right, guys? Guys?"

TK had already started telling Kari about his earlier conversation. Yolei watched them, not paying attention to the words. Why did they always have to do things like that? Just because they were dating didn't mean they could ignore her like this! Suddenly, Kari gasped and began marching TK out the door. "Hey! Where are you going?" Yolei cried, noticing the Digimon had disappeared on her. Oh, no, the kitchen!

"Chill, we're not leaving the building!" TK called back to her before Kari slammed the door behind them and locked a random three out of the four dead bolts.

"My brother has some serious explaining to do," Kari growled. "This is too far."

"Yeah, usually he keeps the ball gag for Izzy since he hasn't figured out how to ditch them yet..." TK commented.

She rolled her eyes. "I meant threatening castration, but that's messed up too."

They stepped into the elevator only to find Tai already standing inside. "Need a 'lift'?"

TK tried to run back out, but the door had already closed.

"Relax, willya? I left my pun-tility belt upstairs," Tai continued, "Nice of you two to 'drop' by, though."

"Wha- you didn't," Kari said, glaring at her brother.

"No, because Ken wouldn't let me use his wire-cutters. Isn't it just none-ball-eivable?"

TK sighed. Time to bite the bullet. "All right, two questions: Why are you here, and why do you have it out for me so bad?"

Kari seemed to be wondering the same thing, so they stared at Tai. He was starting to feel pun-comfortable. "Um, well... I'm not trying to stop you guys from getting Patamon!" The elevator stopped and all three got out. "I... uh... planned a picnic!" The second question was left unanswered.

"With what food?" Kari asked, stopping at the door to TK's apartment.

"This!" Tai proclaimed, pulling a loaf of bread from his pants. He knew that thing would come in handy! The younger children stared at him wide-eyed.

"Um, I'm pretty sure those pants don't have pockets," TK noted, his back against the door as he tried to unlock it left-handed. No _way_ was he staying. He'd been mentally scarred enough for one day.

Tai beamed. "You're absolutely right! They're comfy and easy to wear because they don't have any pun-kets to get in my way!"

"Tai, we didn't need to know that, and we don't want your pants bread," Kari said bluntly.

"I thought you'd be the 'yeast' likely to refuse it, after all, it's 'breader' than what we get at home," her brother replied, pouting. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed TK trying to escape. Time for Plan B. "I can't let you do that."

"Ugh, why couldn't Mom wait five more minutes to go back to work?" the younger boy muttered. "Is duct tape really the best you've got?"

The taunt didn't work. "Looks like you're in a sticky situation," Tai giggled as he taped TK's ankles together. He cut another strip of duct tape with his giant scissors.

Kari just stood there and smiled. Suspicious behavior! "You're not gonna try to loosen him up?"

"Nope. Just taking a few pictures for Mom," Kari informed him, focusing her camera on Tai's failed attempt to get TK's wrists taped. The younger boy decided that enough was enough and punched Tai in the gut.

"I'm sure my mom would want to see these too... this can't be legal," TK commented as he and Tai began a slap fight. Kari took even more pictures. Tai let out a girly shriek and ran away, taking his pants-bread with him. TK fell over on his back, complaining about how hard it was to get duct tape residue off. "I found Tai's giant scissors," she told him, holding up the two-foot-long Hello Kitty monstrosities Tai left behind.

"I don't want to know," he murmured, staring at the sheer absurdity of Kari separating his ankles with... wow, even the _blades_ were pink and sparkly!

"There! All gone. Need anything else while we're here?" she asked, pulling the duct tape off.

"I'll shove some stuff in a suitcase," he replied, darting through the door before anything else disturbing could happen. Within ten minutes he and Patamon emerged, the latter sitting on top of a medium-sized rolling suitcase.

"Let's hurry up and leave before he comes back! Tai's scarier than all the stuff you keep in you backpack. Don't you have a locker or something for your nasty gym shirt?" Patamon complained.

TK smiled. "I missed you too, buddy."

* * *

><p>Around 9 p.m. Yolei realized that there were only two beds in the bunker. "How're we gonna do this?"<p>

Hawkmon was perched next to her on the armchair. Her vague question had woken him, Agumon, TK, and Kari. Only Armadillomon was still sleeping.

"That's the last time we watch _Batman and Robin,_" Agumon yawned, "Why does Tai like it so much?"

"Prob'ly the constant puns," Kari murmured, "So many ice puns..."

Patamon was the only one to have stayed awake through the whole film (they'd been watching it on the suspiciously-aquired TV.) "Do what, Yolei?"

"Bed down for the night. Anyone want the floor?"

Armadillomon was curled up on the less-hideous couch next to Agumon. "We'll take this couch," the dinosaur said.

"I'm fine with the other couch," Yolei remarked, wondering how the queen-sized sheet would fit on either cot. She solved the problem by shoving them together.

"Looks like you guys get the beds!" Patamon chirped, flapping over to the less-hideous couch. This way he might actually sleep at night.

TK and Kari looked at each other and shrugged. Wouldn't be the first time... "Say anything and you're sleeping in the bedroom," Kari warned Yolei. The older girl kept her mouth shut.

The chorus of good-nights was said, and the leg lamp turned off.

* * *

><p>"Tai, can we pun-lease sleep now?" Ken whined, hating how he was being forced to use anything that could possibly pass for a pun... actually, now that he thought about it, Davis had pretty much just said to stick the word "pun" into whatever he could.<p>

Tai gave a moan from the corner where Matt had thrown him after seeing Kari's pictures. She'd e-mailed them to everyone.

"It's eleven o'clock. Anyone here get up before noon?" Matt asked, glaring at Tai.

"We've got a meeting then," Davis reminded him, "Gomamon, wake us up at ten."

"Got it! Veemon, you know where I can find a bucket?"

On that frightening note, the boys all went to sleep.

* * *

><p>"Where is everyone?" Joe wondered. It was 11:55 a.m. and only Team Sora was at the soccer field.<p>

"That's odd... we're the ones that _don't_ live together," Tentomon commented. Izzy was putting the finishing touches on his "civilized" way for this to go.**  
><strong>

Gatomon's ears twitched. "I hear Yolei yelling."

"...I'm sorry, but that's what you get for stealing my camera!" Kari finished as her team came into view.

"You did take pictures of us sleeping," TK pointed out before he noticed that the team had arrived.

Yolei rolled her eyes. "Yeah, but soy beans? Really? Oh, hey, guys," she added as an afterthought.

Sora sighed. This was getting off to a _great_ start. "We agreed on the whole 'challenges' thing, right? Last place on each team gets eliminated?"

"I still can't believe Tai wanted a death match," Yolei responded. "We only spent three hours figuring this stuff out..."

"Speak of the devil," Hawkmon said, "They're finally coming!"

"We only just got here ourselves," Armadillomon huffed.

Tai's team came in running, exhausted and out of breath. Before any of them could speak, Cody (who had arrived before Sora's team) held up a hand for silence.

"Thanks for paying attention," he began. Armadillomon applauded.

"Uh, thank you. Now, here's how this competition will work. Your team leaders each have a set of demands. The overall winners get their _reasonable_ demands met; the losers have to work off the group tab at Yolei's store." Matt and Joe shuddered involuntarily. Feeding the Digimon had racked up a larger amount than even Digitamamon would ask for.

Cody continued, "There will be a total of seven challenges, starting with a drawing contest. Why Tai would suggest that I have no idea. Anyways, the winning team in each challenge gets three points, second place gets one point, and last gets a random punishment. All the teams will eliminate whoever does the worst in each challenge. Any questions?"

Half the group raised their hands/paws/other appendages. "No? Great! Tai, tell everyone your demands."

"First of all, as the Grand Pungeoneer I think you should all be more o-pun minded. Things will remain as they are, but Kari _will _come home. Also, she will break up with her boyfriend-"

"WE'RE NOT DATING!" TK and Kari shouted in unison.

"Suuure you aren't. You're just saying that so I'll let my guard down. My last demand is ice cream. I need it."

Since none of Tai's demands were unreasonable, the only people who spoke up were on his team.

"You should've demanded shome cake! Cake goesh great with ice cream!" Veemon shouted.

Ken scoffed. "He should've demanded Gomamon learn how to tell time so we wouldn't've been late."

"Hey! I know how to tell time!" Gomamon defended.

"Then why did you wake us up at 11:50?"

"It took longer than I thought it would to find everything I needed, okay? And I wanted your first time waking up together as a team to be special!"

"You filled up a few buckets, then you used Marching Fishes on us! And then you dumped the buckets on us!"

"I wasn't sure if you guys would wake up or not..."

Sora handed Izzy a notecard. "Sora has requested that if our team is victorious everything will go back to the way it was before Tai's descent into madness," Izzy read off, "That includes living situations. Also Matt, Tai, and Yolei will write apology letters to those they've wronged."

Gatomon added, "And Miko has to go!"

Kari facepalmed. "I've told you a hundred times, we can't do that!"

"Unreasonable," Cody decided, "Any other objections?" Other than some grumbling from Tai and Davis there were none. "All right, Yolei."

"Tai and Davis _will_ stop with all the puns!" she announced, "And Davis has to give Kari her bed back and clean the whole room."

Davis and Tai protested, but Cody figured it was fair enough.

Tai decided that he had to talk again. "Everypun come back here tomorrow, same pun time, same pun channel!"

* * *

><p><strong>* The Ladybug phone... oh man. TK's mom seems like she'd be protective especially with Tai's and Oikawa's creeper-ness, but no way would she get him an actual phone. Those things can only call home and 911 (I'm pretty sure, anyways...). I was gonna go with the Firefly GlowPhone that I grew up seeing commercials for but I wasn't sure if those were from 2002 so I went with a fictional one instead. Nigie (that's her new nickname, because something something KND) says they're from Wimpy Kid. Good enough for me.<strong>

**Author's Note: Yeah, I should work on something else... but this needed me to finish so Nigie can do the next one. So yeah, the next stuff will be really fun to write. Also I have a poll now. Vote or something whatever review!**


	4. Luck of the Draw

Night came and went, and by noon the next day everyone had gathered back at the soccer field. Almost everyone, that is. Once again, Team Tai was running as fast as they could up the street.

"I can't... believe you did... that!" Matt panted as they reached everyone else.

Gomamon stopped to catch his breath before repling, "I didn't do anything!"

"That's the problem. You were awake for four hours, and you didn't wake any of us up!" the blonde complained.

"Ken said he didn't want me to do that after what happened yesterday. And why'd ya make me wear this dumb thing?" Gomamon asked, pulling at his hoodie, which was the standard-issue disguise for all of the Digimon... except Gatomon, Biyomon, Wormmon, and Armadillomon. "It's just stupid!"

"You're stupid!"

By now the other teams were staring at them. While the argument continued, the team leaders were trying to decide what challenge should come after the drawing contest.

"Obstacle course?" Yolei suggested.

"I love it!" Tai agreed waaay too enthusiastically. "I'll call it the Obsta-kill course! Pun-fection!"

She and Sora groaned at the puns. "Now I wish I'd kept my mouth shut..."

"We could each have an hour to set up traps and stuff," Sora said, trying to ignore her boyfriend being an idiot in the background.

Yolei thought about this for awhile. "It could be a lot of work for one person. How about the losers from each team help their leader set stuff up?"

Tai agreed, and the decision was made. After Yolei left to break up Matt and Gomamon's argument, and Tai left to go do "Tai things", Sora turned to Izzy.

"You get all of that?" she asked.

"I'm throwing this challenge so the obstacle course will be nearly impossible for anyone who doesn't know where the traps are," he stated. Sora nodded. The other teams wouldn't know what hit them.

* * *

><p>"Let's just start already," Tai complained, "I need to BLOW YOUR MINDS with my awe-pun abilities and destroy my baby sister's love life!"<p>

"What love life?" Kari asked, confused.

Yolei spoke up. "Y'know, you, TK, dat-"

"WE'RE NOT DATING!" the totally-not-a-couple protested, turning matching shades of red.

"If you want people to believe you, you should probably stop doing that," Joe advised.

Cody finally announced the challenge. "You guys have an hour to draw-"

"Whoever you looove the mostest!" Yolei interrupted.

"No prob-pen! This'll make my map look like it was drawn by a dog!" boasted Tai.

No one commented. Yolei was scared that he might actually be telling the truth, and outdraw everyone there. Half of her team didn't have opposable thumbs, after all.

"I won't let that happen!" she yelled, slapping Tai. Tai hastily threw a punch that was easily blocked by his opponent. "You can't stop me! I'm too awe-pun to be stopped!"

Meanwhile, everybody else had started drawing. Matt looked up from his barely started picture to watch the brawl. After a few minutes of watching Tai get wailed on by a teenaged girl, he asked Sora a question.

"Did it look this ridiculous when _we_ fought?"

"Yes," she answered, not even looking at the fight. She was too busy trying to figure out how to draw Biyomon to care about whatever mess Tai got himself into. Her train of thought was interrupted by two really bright lights.

"Wormmon, digivolve to... Stingmon!"

"Patamon, digivolve to... Angemon! The one with the thumbs!"

"That's not how you usually announce it," TK pointed out, shielding his eyes from the glare.

Angemon picked up a colored pencil just to see if he could hold it right. He could. "Yeah, but usually I digivolve to help fight darkness. _This_ time I did it for hands!"

Somehow Yolei and Tai hadn't noticed the transformation sequences. Probably because now Tai was winning. After another ten minutes of the struggle Cody stepped in to break it up.

"Knock it off you two! Yolei, this is worse than you with Davis. You only have forty-five minutes left, so I suggest you get started."

Tai immediately ran over to a pile of crayons and grabbed all of them. He started wildly scribbling on a nearby piece of yellow construction paper. His masterpiece was pun-derway.

* * *

><p>Izzy was at a loss for how he could guarantee losing for his team, yet not do bad enough that they lost. The obvious way was to do a terrible job, and he didn't know anyone as terrible as Tai when it came to art. He figured he could just copy whatever Tai scrawled down, fix it up a little bit, and color it like Tentomon. That would make sure that he was better than Tai, and that none of his teammates could do any worse. It was a win-win!<p>

He tried to see what Tai was 'drawing', but the pun-crazed maniac had covered himself with a tarp.

"Tai, why are you under a tarp?" Izzy asked. "Where did you even _get _a tarp?"

"Believe me, you _don't _wanna know," Ken cut in.

"NOBODY CAN SEE MY MASTERPIECE PUN-TIL IT'S PUN-PLETED!"

Okay, so Tai had gone crazier. He'd have to scrap that plan. Maybe he could just use his left hand and half-ass it. He couldn't even draw a decent circle left-handed, so that should work out. He started his picture.

* * *

><p>Agumon walked up to the tarp. "Tai, can I please borrow a brown crayon?"<p>

"NO! Steal someone else's crayon!"

He left and asked around for the brown crayon he needed to color in Tai's hair. No one had one. The closest thing he could find was half a black crayon, and since his partner was acting really weird today, it would have to do.

* * *

><p>Kari put the finishing touches on her picture of Gatomon. There was still half an hour left, so she decided to see what TK was doing. He had just finished drawing Patamon, and was starting on his brother.<p>

"Who are you drawing?" she asked.

"Well, first I drew Patamon, but I've got time left so I figured I should draw my brother too. Even if he _has _been really, _really_ annoying lately," he replied.

Kari was confused. "We can draw more than one person?" She didn't remember that being in the rules.

"The challenge was to draw _whoever_ you love the most. My whoever just happens to be Patamon and Matt."

This changed everything for Kari. Now she wouldn't have to offend anyone! She flipped over her picture of Gatomon and started to sketch out a much smaller one. She'd have to work fast to fit everybody in.

* * *

><p>"Marching Fishes!" Gomamon shouted, flinging fish at Joe's back. For some reason his partner looked mad at him.<p>

"What was that for?"

He shrugged. "I need to draw Arthur, and you were the closest target." They were as far away from each other as possible. It didn't look like Joe was falling for it.

"Um, old time's sake?" Gomamon tried. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to finish this."

He changed a few lines on his picture and added Arthur, one of the blue marching fishes. Perfect. Now he just had to wait twenty minutes...

"Marching Fishes!" Annoying Joe was always a good way to kill time.

* * *

><p>Armadillomon was sitting near Cody, surrounded by broken drawing implements. "Ah just can't do this... Cody, can ah just quit?"<p>

"But if you quit, you're out of the contest," Cody reminded him, utterly surprised that his partner was throwing in the towel. Then again, he'd been trying to pick up crayons, markers, and colored pencils with his mouth for forty-five minutes straight without success.

"Well, that's all right by me. Ah missed you, y'know."

Cody looked perplexed. "It was only one night..."

"An' ah only ate half the stuff in the larder, but ah still hadta watch that terrible movie!" Armadillomon shuddered at the memory. He'd passed out before the first half hour was up.

"I'll tell the others, then..."

* * *

><p>"...and then she hit me in the chest! Who does that?" complained Davis. He'd spent the entire contest complaining to Ken about Yolei. Some of the highlights were how she hates puns, physically abuses him, and won't let him take food from her store for free. Ken was sick of listening to him. Drawing Wormmon was so much harder when someone was shouting in his ear.<p>

"You do know you only have ten minutes left to finish your picture, right?" Ken asked, hoping that Davis was already done. He hadn't seen him draw anything, though.

"Wait... picture?" Ken facepalmed. Davis was stunned into silence for about ten seconds. "I NEED TO DRAW SOMEONE, FAST!"

He plopped down next to his Jogress partner and took some of his colored pencils. Then he began his last-second drawing of Kari. He wished that he had more time to work. After all, you can't rush perfection, and that's just what Kari is. Two minutes later, he realized he could just draw Veemon. He flipped over his picture and started drawing his partner.

* * *

><p>"Time's up!" Cody announced. Everyone stopped drawing and Tai threw his tarp into the air dramatically, Ken jumping away from where it landed. He struck a pose and said in a voice he thought sounded heroic, "My masterpiece is pun-plete! Gaze u-pun the awe-inspiring beauty that puts every other work of art on the face of the pun-pet to shame!" His so-called masterpiece was the worst thing Cody had ever seen, but he didn't want to crush Tai's dreams.<p>

"It's, uh, something."

Tai was unimpressed by that response. "I know it's something, but what _kind_ of something? I want your 100% honest o-pun-ion on just how awe-pun it is."

He took a deep breath. "Well, it's so bad that I can't even think of a word for how bad it is. Who is that supposed to be? It doesn't look like anything, much less anyone."

"It's pretty obvious who it is, right guys?" he asked in an attempt to defend his work. Nobody had any idea, except for Izzy.

"You started to draw Agumon then switched to Kari, changed your mind and tried to change it to Davis, changed your mind again and started to draw... something. Then you panicked and scribbled random colors over it?" he guessed.

"He almost got it! After Davis I tried drawing the Trix rabbit," Tai proclaimed.

Cody still didn't see it. "So, the oval thing near the bottom is Agumon's tail, and the sombrero is Davis's hair? That doesn't explain why you colored in half of the face red, or gave it purple arms. Or why those two blue things are there."

"Those are the goggles, and the arms are purple 'cause I couldn't find a pink crayon. And the face is red 'cause, well," he broke off and looked at Kari meaningfully. She huffed and looked away.

"You lose, and your team probably will too," Cody said.

"What?" Tai's team protested, glaring at him.

"The other teams would have to screw up really bad and you guys would have had to do amazing jobs for Team Tai to even have a chance."

Cody looked at the rest of Team Tai's pictures to see if they were still in the running for second. Although Ken's picture of Wormmon and Gomamon's picture of himself attacking Joe with marching fishes were both really good, they had no chance. Stingmon's picture of Ken was okay, Davis's picture of Veemon was rushed, and Matt's picture of Sora (his attempt to kiss up to her; he received a pat on the head for his troubles) wasn't good enough to make a difference. Gabumon and Agumon's pictures of their partners were both pretty bad, mostly due to the fact that neither of them had thumbs.

"Sorry guys, but you still lost. One of the other teams would need something worse than what Tai drew, and I don't think that's possible," Cody informed them, still wondering how something as horrible as Tai's picture could even exist in nature.

He then looked at Team Sora's pictures. Sora's picture was of Biyomon. Just Biyomon. "Did it really take you an hour to draw that?"

"I had to get the shading right!" she protested. After looking a bit closer, Cody saw that it was almost perfect. It looked like she'd used at least twenty-seven shades of pink to color her partner's feathers.

Biyomon's picture of Sora, however, wasn't nearly as good. But considering she couldn't really use a pencil that well with her talons, it was remarkable that it was recognisable as her partner. Gatomon... well, she drew what she loves most. Salmon. "I'm sorry Kari, but that fish means more to me than our bond."

"I know," Kari sighed. Cody ignored the interruption and voiced his opinion.

"Gatomon... that's actually pretty good. And it looks a lot easier to draw than Kari."

Tentomon's picture of Izzy and Gabumon's picture of Matt were both decent, but Joe's picture was of a young woman that Cody didn't recognize. "Who is that, Joe?"

"My girlfriend," he muttered, watching as everyone else stood open-mouthed in shock.

"Joe has a _girlfriend_?" most of the Digimon, Tai, Davis, Ken, Yolei, and Kari asked in unison. The others just smirked and nodded.

"Her name is Megumi Sato," Joe told them, "and we've been dating for a year and a half..."

Tai stormed off, but since he'd already been judged nobody really cared. "I can't believe Joe got a girlfriend before me... _and _before Matt... what's next, Izzy and Mimi secretly dating behind everyone's backs?!" he screeched as he left.

"Not gonna happen," Izzy murmured. Nobody knew who he was talking to, but just him talking reminded Cody that he still had yet to see the computer geek's artwork.

"Artwork."

It was almost close to being as horrendous as Tai's... monstrosity, but at least Cody could tell what Izzy had drawn. "Did you do this left-handed or something?" he asked, noting Tentomon's square-shaped head and the laptop's uneven coloring job.

"Um..." Izzy needed some kind of cover, fast! "Um... uh..."

"No, he's just really, really bad with traditional art," Sora cut in. "You should see his digital gallery sometime." Normally, she wouldn't have bothered to cover for him, but these were dire circumstances. Nobody could know that he was trying to lose on purpose! Fortunately, Cody didn't see through the bluff.

"All right, you guys are guaranteed second place at least. Now let's see how Yolei's team... did..." Cody stopped short when he saw Kari's gigantic picture. "How many pieces did you tape together?"

Kari counted off on her fingers. "Um... I think this was four sheets of paper..."

He looked at the giant crowd of people she drew. "Who _didn't_ you draw?"

"TK." This response caused Yolei to rip the picture out of Kari's hands and start scanning it for the other half of the couple. She saw everybody who was at the park, Kari's parents, and a ton of other people who it didn't make sense for them to be included.

"Is that Mr. Fujiyama standing next to TK's mom?" she asked in disbelief. "Tell me you did not draw your boyfriend's-"

"WE'RE _JUST FRIENDS_!" TK and Kari protested, blushing furiously.

Kari took the picture back from Yolei and started pointing people out. "Here's the school nurse, the guy who runs the fish market, a Numemon, that girl who sits behind me in math class..." The list went on and on. "Basically, everyone I know except for TK."

"Why didn't you draw him?!" Yolei's face was turning purple. Why were they so in denial?

"You'd take it as proof that we're dating, which we're not."

Once Yolei calmed down (only to spaz out again when she realized that TK hadn't drawn Kari), Cody moved on to TK's picture. He drew Patamon sitting on top of his brother's head. "I look way too happy in that picture, I hate sitting on Matt! His hair gel is really pointy," Patamon criticized.

"How was I supposed to know that?" his partner asked.

"You could've just, oh, I don't know, _touched his head._"

"Why would I touch his head?"

"He touches your head all the time!" Apparently Patamon didn't quite understand what a noogie was.

Cody looked at Yolei's drawing as the two continued bickering. "I drew Poromon!" she announced. It was a really good picture, but he couldn't help but feel that she was being lazy. Still, it was better than Kari's giant crowd; although it had taken her a lot of effort, the figures were only just recognizable as the people they represented. Hawkmon's picture, for somemon who didn't have opposable thumbs, was actually pretty good. He got brownie points for Yolei being so hard to draw.

Now Cody only had one picture left to see, since his partner had quit. "All right, Patamon, where's your... picture..."

It was frighteningly accurate, right down to the ever-present smile. "You drew me as an eight-year-old?" TK asked, the bickering having ended. Patamon nodded, beaming. "How'd you get it so... perfect?"

"The magic of thumbs!" his partner exclaimed. "Tai might use them for evil, but that doesn't mean I should! And, well, I don't get to be Angemon as much anymore, so I kinda remembered that hat better."

"But you digivolve to form Shakkoumon..." Cody pointed out.

"It's not the same!" Patamon complained. "Not that I don't like it, but I really miss having thumbs."

"Well, since Armadillomon has decided to drop out," Cody began, pausing so everyone had time to react to the news and for dramatic effect, "I declare that Team... Yolei wins!"

Davis raised his hand, ignoring the fact that they weren't in school. "So did we get second?" he wondered when Cody noticed and called on him.

"What do you think?"

The goggle boy hung his head and sighed. "Oh well," he said about five seconds later, perking up. "We'll just make a pun-back! Yeah, a real pun-from-behind victory!"

"Davis, please stop talking now," Ken pleaded, pulling his friend aside. "Who else is out?"

"Do I really have to answer that? You all know about Tai's... thing... and Izzy drew a computer better than his own partner. It was still pretty bad, but... sorry, you're done."

Izzy shrugged, but some-pun else didn't take elimination so well. "NO!" Tai screamed, suddenly running back. "I WAS PUN-DENIABLY THE BEST! How did this happen? HOW?"

Everyone looked at him, shook their heads, and left. "Whatever, I don't need you... tomorrow, we have an obsta-kill course to build! And you'll see... you'll ALL SEE!"

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note: For the record, I blame Kia, my horribly-pen-named sister for this taking so long to update. Even though I'm the one who procrastinated so much... but she started it! It's been two months since she updated Offscreen Adventures. Tai's terrible art skills are going to become the cover of this fic. Part of my procrastination was drawing his... whatever it was on Paint.<strong>

**Kia: Hey, guys, I really need a new pen name... anyways, she's one to talk about procrastination, _how _long has it been since she's updated any of _her _stuff or done anything new? But I digress. So, next chapter is mine again. Just when I thought I wouldn't have to type the word "pun" for awhile... but yeah, they're really doing an obstacle course, and since Izzy's doing a lot of the traps, well... let's just say it's gonna live up to Tai's name for it. Somewhat. I can't really kill anyone off, since this is a humor fic and all. Injuries on the other hand...**

**Thanks for reviewing, and let us know what y'all think!**


	5. The Obsta-Kill Course

The time came for the "Obstakill Course" to be run. As had become the custom, all three teams and Cody gathered at noon. This time, the venue of choice was a disused rock quarry in the Digital World. Tai, knowing that he wouldn't have to participate, had gone all out with the obstacles he'd designed. Yolei had been unoriginal, but had chosen effective obstacles. Sora had put together obstacles that she _thought _people would have difficulty with, while Izzy booby-trapped a good portion of the course.

"This _is_ all non-lethal, right?" Cody asked Izzy pointedly. Izzy's response of "in theory" hadn't been good enough for him, so the computer geek begrudgingly disarmed several tripwires. "That's better... I think." While Cody had checked the course over the day before during set-up, he was not sure which of Izzy's many, many traps had the potential to seriously injure or kill. "All right, first_ team_ to cross the finish line wins."

"Shouldn't we go over the course first?" Joe asked nervously, not wanting to blindly rush in.

"Of _course _we can," Tai answered, raising his eyebrows just in case anyone thought his pun was unintentional. "It o-puns with a 200 meter sprint, then you've gotta-"

Yolei interrupted, "-cross a balance beam over a mud pit, crawl through a tunnel, make it across the water hazard, dodge some ball launchers, go through some tires, and climb a 40 foot rope or the cliff to get to the finish line! Any more questions?"

"Joe and I can't swim," TK pointed out, "and a lot of our partners can't either. Is there another way through the water?"

"Ha... funny you should mention that..." Tai said as if he hadn't been the one to come up with the water hazard. "Unless you've got wings, no."

"Wait, you can't swim?" Yolei asked TK, realizing that this could end badly.

Oddly enough, Davis was the first to respond. "Duh! Don'tcha remember when we got trapped in that oil rig or whatever it was?"

"How could I forget?" Cody muttered. "You guys forced me into the escape pod against my will."

"Yeah, well, you _were _the only one who would fit," Kari reminded him for the sixtieth time. "We definitely went over who could and couldn't swim while you were gone."

Yolei facepalmed. "We did, didn't we. I totally forgot! Sorry!"

TK shrugged. He forgot things all the time, so he wasn't gonna hold it against her. "Let's just get this over with."

"Wait, we can use our wings?" Biyomon wondered. She, Hawkmon, and Patamon had been wondering how they'd manage to get through this course without just sitting on their partners, though Patamon planned on doing that anyways. No one would even notice because he was almost always on TK's head.

"Sure," Cody decided. "There's no rules against helping each other, either. Okay, now that we've cleared all that up, let's start. On your mark... get set... GO!"

For the most part, humans outpaced Digimon during the opening sprint. The exceptions were Kari, who had tripped over a loose stone, and Gatomon, who was squarely in the middle of the pack. Yolei, unsurprisingly, made it to the balance beam first, closely followed by Joe. The balance beam failed to trip anyone up for the most part, though Joe, Ken, and Gomamon all ended up in the mud at least once.

What Cody had forgotten to mention was that there were also roughly 200 meters separating each obstacle. Yolei could sprint for long periods of time, but she couldn't convince herself to squeeze through the small tunnel right away. Her lead was lost to Gatomon, who had no problem whatsoever. Neither did any of the other Digimon, but most of the kids hesitated at least a little upon reaching the tunnel. It dropped Joe to last place.

The next run was where things really started to go downhill. Izzy had set multiple pitfall traps, most of which were obvious, and had dug several small holes as well. The order of arrival at the water hazard, a 15 meter stretch with a depth of six feet, was more staggered than that of the previous two obstacles. Gatomon managed to avoid all of Izzy's traps and got there first, followed by Davis, Sora (who knew where Izzy had put everything), Veemon (who'd lucked out by not hitting any pitfalls), Yolei, and then a large gap. Next came everyone who was trying harder to avoid pitfalls than to run particularly fast. Ken led that group, carrying Wormmon in his arms as he'd begun doing for all of the running portions. Next came Agumon, Gabumon, Matt, Tentomon, and Biyomon. Finally, after the first group had already made it to the other side of the water (with much complaining from Gatomon), the stragglers showed up.

Kari had fallen victim to a small hole and was limping slightly. TK (with Patamon on his head) was staying back by her partly to make sure she was okay and partly because he _really _didn't want to get in the water. Hawkmon had chosen to fly rather than attempting to run. Joe got stuck in a pitfall but was able to climb out without hurting himself too much. As for Gomamon, well, he was just very slow on land. Once he finally did manage to get to the water, though, he easily passed most of the second group.

"You don't have to do this," Kari said as she and TK finally made it to the water. Patamon agreed with her. Four years ago, TK was much smaller and he had still been too heavy for Patamon to keep him above the water.

"I'll be fine," TK laughed nervously. "It's only fifteen meters. What's the worst that could happen?"

"Well, there's always the possibility of drowning," Hawkmon helpfully chimed in, having caught up with them. By this time Gatomon, Davis, Sora, and Yolei had already made it through the tires.

TK backed away from the water. Was getting Tai and Davis to stop making puns really worth dying? Well, no... but maybe if he just-

"TK!" Kari and Patamon screamed as he fell into the water. He flailed his arms and legs as well as he could, but it wasn't enough to keep his head above water.

Joe jumped in the water without hesitation; he hadn't been paying attention to where he was going and had accidentally knocked TK in. Therefore he had to be the one to get him out, no matter what Kari was yelling at him. In gym class, Joe had learned enough about swimming that he could manage a weak dog paddle, but not for very long. If he didn't pull TK up quickly enough, they'd both be goners.

Somehow Joe managed, but by doing so used up all of his energy. However, he was close enough to the edge that Kari could pull him out. Once Joe and TK had recovered they all said screw it and moved on.

They met up with Gomamon and Matt once they hit the ball launchers. "This... was an awful idea," Matt said, struggling to keep his cool. "Why didn't you call for help?"

"We kinda panicked," Patamon admitted. "Why didn't _you _call for help?"

"Because... I dunno, I didn't think I'd get this beat up from some dumb soccer balls and falling in a hole!" Gomamon complained. "Or at least I thought Matt wouldn't land on me!"

"Wasn't trying! Those ball launchers are tough! But still, _we _got cuts and bruises and _you_ almost died!" Matt yelled. "What were you guys thinking?"

"It's not like we were _planning _on it," TK muttered, as if that made a difference. "Everyone else is probably done already, though..."

That was the wrong thing to say. "HOW DO YOU STILL CARE ABOUT THE COMPETITION? YOU ALMOST FUCKING DIED!"

TK didn't really have a good response for that, so he just started running towards the ball launchers. Everyone else followed, Matt continuing to lecture. They made it through without further incident, though on the way over to the tires they ended up getting stuck in a glue trap. Someone else seemed to have tripped practically everything that could possibly be in the tires. That just left the rope climb.

After Kari fell into every single pitfall between the tires and the rope, they finally made it to the end. "Not sure... we're gonna make it... up there..." Joe panted.

"C'mon, Kari! It's just like in gym class!" TK called from ten feet up the rope, Kari slightly ahead of him. Both of them started laughing for reasons Matt, Joe, and Gomamon could only guess. Matt sighed and began to climb as well, while Joe grabbed Gomamon in one arm and climbed up the cliff face in one of the most dangerous ways he could've chosen.

All of them made it up without incident and then proceeded to collapse. "Gonna kill you... Izzy," Kari murmured, bleeding from several minor cuts.

"I'm gonna kill whoever designed that water hazard!" Matt declared, glancing between Sora, Tai, and Yolei.

"Who won?" Gomamon asked.

Cody took a deep breath. "Well..."

"KARI!" Tai bellowed, running to his sister. "What have I done? This all started because of me!"

"Well, yeah, but-"

"But nothing, Kari! What if I- or you- or- I can't do this anymore! Kari, if you come home... I'll make less puns! I promise! Davis can go back home, we'll clean the room up, anything!" Tai cried.

To his surprise, everyone else breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes! It's over!" Sora exclaimed.

"Eh, it was fun while it lasted," Davis said. "You can be home by tomorrow!"

"Hey, I always thought this was stupid," Cody said bluntly. "Let's go home, everyone."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note: *insert obligatory college-related you've-heard-nothing-from-me-in-like-a-year apology here* Well, it's tradition to updateone-shot on New Year's so... here y'all go! Closure! This fic was intended to be a LOT longer, but we obviously ran out of steam. Since it had a story rather than being a collection of one-shots, no matter how stupid the premise, we figured it'd be best to just end this. Hopefully I'll have some updates for the 02 fic out before I go back to college, but I can't guarantee. I'm writing a new first chapter, changing the summary, finishing chapter eight, and writing a ninth chapter as well. Anyways, back to this fic. Thanks for reading and reviewing! Sorry it had to end like this!**


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